Berlin: Merlin Rose: A handful of people drove gentrification

Actor Merlin Rose (30) has lived in Berlin since his childhood and is concerned about the changes in the capital. “Of course the city has changed because of Corona. But I wouldn’t say that it’s just because of Corona. This is a process that started long before,” said the 30-year-old (“Das Boot”) in Berlin German press agency. “Corona certainly concentrated and brought the whole thing to a boil.”

“That small record stores somehow disappear, somehow here and there the nice neighborhood bar, the corner bar closes. And that’s of course a shame,” he said. A lot of money was invested “by a handful of people who wanted to make money,” said the actor, who was seen this week in the six-part “House of Glass” on the first. The series is in the ARD media library. “I’m happy about every little record shop, every neighborhood bar or every small retail store that is still there.”

Gentrification at Mauerpark

“I grew up in Wedding and don’t want to move away. I don’t want to because my neighborhood is very important to me.” Rose remembers his first contact with the topic of gentrification as a teenager: “The first time I was confronted with it was when it started that Mauerpark was going to be built on. That smelled so bad to me at the time and I had a lot of it “Spent time at the many demonstrations against the development of Mauerpark, against gentrification itself,” said Rose. “I had the feeling that the city was becoming more and more capital for investors than for us people who actually live here and want to enjoy this city in some way.”

Of the legendary scene years of the 1990s in the Prenzlauer Berg district, he said that he only experienced the “last reaches,” said the actor, who was born in 1993.